They crawled out of the dark like rot from a wound.
Thin, bone-white things with twitching limbs and hollow eyes. Their bodies were stretched too long, like someone had tried to make dogs out of corpses and lost patience halfway through. The first one didn't growl—it clicked, low and wet, before hurling itself at me.
I barely raised my sword in time.
My arms shook.
I kicked the beast off, stumbling backward into the muck. The blade had left a gash down its side, but no blood came—only thick, black sludge that hissed as it hit the grass. It reeked of rusted copper and rot.
"Shit," I hissed, steadying my breath.
A second one slinked out, followed by three more. Each moved wrong—limbs bending at odd angles, paws scraping like claws across stone. Their maws hung open, tongues split and twitching.
I counted seven.
Just my luck.
Mana surged in my chest. I pressed it down, shaping it, breathing slow. Father would call this recklessness. Rodrick would laugh. Kael would—well, Kael did throw me into this pit, didn't he?
"'Not your first time, not your last,'" I muttered. "'It'll build character,' he says. Bastard."
My white tunic—meant to look noble even here—was already streaked with filth. The first swipe left a smear of black across the chest, like ink spilled over snow.
Three on the left. Two on the right. One limping behind. One circling wide.
I exhaled through grit teeth.
"Let's see if you bastards die proper, or squirm like the rest."
They charged.
I shifted my stance. Let the world fade. Just breath, steel, and instinct.
The first hound pounced.
I sidestepped, slashing low. A leg came clean off, but the thing didn't fall—it dragged itself forward, teeth gnashing, until I kicked it straight into a tree trunk. Bone cracked.
Another came from behind. I turned too slow.
Pain flared in my side as claws raked across my ribs. I spun, summoned flame to my palm—and blasted it point-blank.
It screamed, more like metal screeching than anything living. The fire took its face clean off.
Two more replaced it instantly.
Too many.
"I fell back to the outcrop, forcing their charge into a corridor of death. No flanks. No retreat. Just steel—and whatever was left of my mana."
I gritted my teeth, sweat dripping into my eyes.
"Come on, then," I growled. " My Steel's hungry, and I've got no patience".
They charged.
This time, I didn't hesitate.
The sword became an extension of my breath, my azure flames engulfing it. I carved through flesh, dodged jaws, sent one crashing into another with a wave of flame.
But they kept coming.
My arm ached. My side bled. My mana reserves thinned.
I staggered. One leapt.
Then—
A blur of silver steel. A flash of white-hot mana.
The hound's head exploded midair.
Kael landed beside me, broad-shouldered, calm as ever. Blood spattered across his coat like it was nothing new.
"Well," he said, sword resting on his shoulder, "I did say they'd make you sweat."
I collapsed to one knee, breathing hard. "You could've come earlier."
Kael smirked. "And ruin your first real scar story? I wouldn't dare."
"I looked down at my tunic—white once, now drowned in black blood and mud."
"Fantastic," I muttered. "Marie is going to kill me."
He laughed, then extended a hand.
I took it, steadying myself.
I fought them in a place men call the Black Valley—though no map bothers naming it. Just another wound on the flesh of Valcrin, where the five kingdoms bleed each other more often than they do the beasts at their gates.
Zair sings to steel beneath sun-scoured dunes.
Neradien drowns its prayers where the tide never rests.
Eirel watches in silence behind it's frostbitten walls.
Virella smiles with clean hands while others do the bleeding.
And finally, welcome to Solaris—where we send boys to bleed in the dark and call it duty.